This may be more than most would want to read on
this subject.  Sorry, but someone has to say it
"in public".

I just ran into a beekeeper today who asked about the
whole issue of "BioDynamic Beekeeping", as defined by
Gunter Hawk up at the Pfeiffer Center in upstate NY.

While I know that Charlie's heart is in the right
place, and he only wants to promote his "apitherapy"
blog, there's a line that divides "interesting" from
"highly questionable" and given all the legitimate work 
that is being done with honey and apitherapy these days, 
the last thing we need is the mythology of Steiner, Pfeiffer, 
Anthroposophy, and the so-called "biodynamic" approach 
to anything tainting the already somewhat fringe reputation
of "apitheraphy".  Of course, he may not even realize
that he has posted anything to do with Steiner, et al
in his blog, or here.

> Steiner was interested in many things...

Rather than any research or study/investigation into subjects 
of interest, the entire basis for Steiner's "Anthroposophy" 
was his self-proclaimed clairvoyance.  Apparently, he honestly
believed he had this ability, as there is no evidence that
he attempted to defraud anyone of any large sums of money.
(Of course, if he actually was clairvoyant, why didn't he
clean up every day at the horse track and/or the roulette wheel?)

But there's something poignant about long-discredited mystical 
belief systems forlornly wandering the internet like unemployed 
magicians begging for someone, anyone to "pick a card, any card".

Steiner, Pfeiffer, Anthroposophy, and the so-called "biodynamic" 
principles are unique in that they attempt to directly address 
gardening/farming and even beekeeping with a mix of occult 
beliefs, rather than practical or scientific knowledge. 
Its doubly pitiful that Steiner would doom his cult to 
trying to recruit from the ranks of beekeepers, a demographic
not known for either their large numbers or thick wallets. 

> I see it as a normal healthy search on some people's part
> for deeper meaning in life

I see it as a symptom of depression - a longing for a world 
that is very different from the way it actually happens to be. 
That's a shame, 'cause the world is a very interesting and
entertaining place just the way it is. 

So, rather than eating prudently and exercising, we can just 
wear magnetic bracelets to stay healthy.  Rather than checking 
our hives and monitoring diseases and pests, we can believe 
that some sort of practice or another, SIMPLY BECAUSE it is 
"rejected by science" will keep them healthy.  Rather than 
testing the soil in our gardens and balancing the nutrients, 
pH, and moisture for the plants we want to grown, we can 
practice "biodynamic" principles, and dilute our fertilizer 
to the point that it should be called "homeopathic fertilizer". 

Of course, none of this stuff works, but that's OK - there's
always another charlatan out there with snake oil of a 
slightly different type to offer the promise of magic beans
yet again when you inevitably fail.
 
But how do otherwise reasonable people "buy" such stuff?

There is a growing fraction of the US population, beekeepers included, 
who seem to want to wear their ignorance as some sort of a badge of 
distinction.  According to a Nov 2007 Harris Poll, a majority of the 
US population believe in miracles (79%), angels (74%), and even the 
devil (62%).  Smaller, but substantial percentages believe in 
ghosts (41%), UFOs (35%), witches (31%), astrology (29%), and 
reincarnation (21%).  These folks will seemingly believe anything, 
even Steiner's book "Bees", in which he claimed that bees have 
harnessed "the power of the crystal" because they build hexagonal comb.

Its magical thinking.  It is the exact opposite of rationality,
reason, and what we call "knowledge".

In another online beekeeping discussion group, there is an actual 
discussion going on entitled "Discounting scientific studies", where 
the entire process of science itself has been rejected by a small
number of beekeepers simply because certain controlled studies do 
not support the "personal experience" of uneducated/uncredentialed, 
but very prolific contributors to online forums.

How does one even begin to comprehend such willful ignorance?

> At the most basic level it's just another way of looking at things,

"Another way" is the relativistic argument, ignoring the issue of 
objective proof, treating everything as a "viewpoint" of equal value, 
giving no weight to tangible evidence.

> Personally I do not like to go too far beyond just what works and what

> doesn't work.

Knowing "what works" is exactly the end result of using science to test 
things and reject mystical belief systems like the mix of very mangled
Buddhist and Hindu dogma called Anthroposophy, and the associated 
"biodynamic agriculture".   (And no, you can't accept one while
rejecting
the other, as the two are BOTH nothing but a rejection of rationality.)

> I've noticed, though, that what works for some doesn't seem to work 
> for others, and I find that really interesting.

Beekeeping is like baton twirling, turning handsprings, eating 
with chopsticks, and nearly all skateboard tricks.  All of them look
fairly easy until you try it yourself.

When something is claimed to work for one person, but found to not work 
for another, this is exactly where science rules while mysticism drools.

Science is exactly how one finds truth among conflicting claims and 
inconsistent results.  Anything else is nothing but personal anecdote,
and the plural of "anecdote" is not "data". 

A recent post to this group was not just mysticism, but the exact same 
mysticism that I find so annoying:

>> Study: Honey is a 'Living' Food, Refined Sugar is Biologically 'Dead'
>> Analysis of Honey Quality Through 'Sensitive Crystallization'

For future reference, when even the authors themselves put the name of 
their methodology in quotes, this is a big clue that one is 
dealing with quackery and pseudo-science.

Pfeiffer created "Sensitive Crystallization" as a tool for use by 
clairvoyants, rather than scientists, farmers, or beekeepers.

The description of "Sensitive Crystallization" given in
the page linked to by the announcement of the "study": 
http://www.physics.mcgill.ca/~kroegerj/crystalse.html
reveals that it is a blatantly and unrepentantly unscientific 
technique, providing results that cannot be quantified.  

The "interpretation" of the patterns created by the crystallization of
Copper 
chloride solutions can only be compared to the process of reading tea
leaves. 
The exact same process was claimed by Pfeiffer to variously identify
healthy 
blood from the blood of tuberculosis patients, to differ between 
"biodynamically" raised food and conventionally-raised food, and to 
even detect cancer via examination of the blood of patients.

This sort of stuff is so surreal, so completely outside the bounds
of plausibility, it is almost a litmus test for not just critical
thinking skills, but the ability to think at all.

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